Challenging the Nimzo-Indian

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The Nimzo-Indian is Black's most respected answer to 1.d4 and is immensely popular at all levels, from club championship to world championship. In fact, the reputation of the Nimzo is so high that some players prefer simply to avoid it and give up all hopes of an opening advantage. American International Master David Vigorito shows that this negative approach is unnecessary.

Challenging the Nimzo-Indian provides detailed coverage of White's most critical try, 4.Qc2. There is sufficient detail for the reader to build a dangerous repertoire with either colour. The chess is certainly at a high level, but Vigorito's logical approach and clear conclusions means that readers can easily grasp the concepts while less experienced players can play through the high-quality games which are comprehensively explained.

How this book came to be...

In the late 1990s I was primarily a 1.d4 player. I preferred many of the most principled opening lines, such as the 4.Qc2 Nimzo-Indian, the 8.Rb1 Griinfeld, and the Bayonet Attack of the Kings Indian. Information was not as readily available back then, however, and as I was not keeping up with theoretical developments, I soon made a switch. Vladimir Kramnik was frequently playing 1.Nf3 in those days, and I realized I could still play many 1.d4 openings by employing this move order. 1.Nf3 worked quite well against certain players. Many people were not prepared for the move and it allowed me to use various move-order tricks both in queen's pawn openings and certain lines of the English Opening. Essentially, I was able to achieve my IM title with very little study by employing 1.Nf3 against untitled players.

In early 2005 the deficiencies of 1.Nf3 started to sink in. If Black plays classical systems such as the Queen's Gambit Accepted, the Queen's Gambit Declined, the Slav, and the Nimzo/ Queen's Indian, then 1.Nf3 has left White with limited options. There are also many lines of the Symmetrical English that are quite satisfactory for Black. Not surprisingly, strong players were hardly taken aback by 1.Nf3 and they would often respond 1...d5. After 2.d4 Nf6 3.c4 Black has much less to worry about than after a "pure" 1.d4 move order. For example, in the Queen's Gambit Accepted, one of White's sharpest tries is 1.d4 d5 2.c4 dxc4 3.e4. In the Queen's Gambit Declined, the Exchange Variation is one of White's most principled tries, and the most dangerous move-order for Black is 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.cxd5 exd5 5.Bg5. The delay in development of White's king's knight makes it more difficult for Black to find a post for his c8-bishop, and White may also play Nge2 at some point, intending f2-f3.

So what does all this have to do with the 4.Qc2 Nimzo-Indian? Well, if you want to play 1.d4, then one of the first things you must ask yourself is "What to do about the Nimzo?" If you play 3.Nf3 then Black will have several solid options, such as 3...d5 leading again to various Queen's Gambits, the Queens Indian 3...b6, and the Bogo-Indian 3...Bb4+. Black can also play 3...c5, as after 4.d5 d6 5.Nc3 exd5 6.cxd5 g6 Black has avoided several of White's more dangerous systems, again because of the early development of White's knight to f3. So let's just allow the Nimzo! I am well aware that most Nimzo-Indian players are happy to see 3.Nc3 because the Nimzo-Indian is generally more interesting than the Queen's Gambit Declined or the Queen's Indian. The same could be said about 3.e4 in the Queen's Gambit Accepted: it is an interesting line. For a while it seemed to me that White should not allow Black to play their favourite systems. Then it occurred to me that the Nimzo-Indian is popular because it is a dynamic and rich opening. Why would I want to avoid that? If I have White, I should strive for the maximum advantage out of the opening. I mean, how much can one really get against the Lasker or Tartakower variations of the Queen's Gambit Declined?

Please allow me to return once again to 2005.1 realized that I must start preparing to dump 1.Nf3 in favour of 1 .d4. In the summer I qualified to play in the U.S. Closed Championship and I was determined to not only play 1 .d4, but also to avoid losing with White. I did not have such a great tournament, but I did achieve my humble goals. I felt that by playing 1.Nf3 against grandmasters I was already conceding my chances for not only an advantage, but an interesting game. I am aware that this is a bit of an overstatement, but I do feel that by only playing 1.Nf3 I was missing out on a lot of interesting chess.

Once I had decided that I must return to 1.d4, I quickly decided to play the Nimzo-Indian with White. 4.Qc2 had always been my favourite line. White avoids doubled pawns and prepares 5.a3 to get the bishop pair. 4.Qc2 has also been a consistent choice of grandmasters for two decades. There are many typical themes in the 4.Qc2 Nimzo-Indian, such as White's bishop pair, Black's lead in development, etc. Instead of writing a long introduction demonstrating these themes, I have decided to let the games within the book illustrate the themes. I have also chosen not to dwell on the history of the line. This has all been covered before, and although 4.Qc2 is sometimes referred to as the "Capablanca Variation" I do not see how this is relevant to today's tournament players. If a player wants to study the 4.Qc2 Nimzo-Indian, he should look at the modern experts on the line. There are many, and the list has some pretty good players: Kramnik, Kasparov, Karpov (isn't that enough already!?), Ivan Sokolov, Mikhail Gurevich, Seirawan, and Bareev are its greatest exponents, while players such as Topalov, Anand, Shirov, Ivanchuk, Van Wely, Aronian, Gelfand, Korchnoi, Dreev, Kiril Georgiev, Khalifman, Beliavsky, Onischuk, Sasikiran, Lautier, Shipov, and Nakamura have also often played it. Actually, the only elite grandmasters who have not employed 4.Qc2 are "1.e4 - only" players such as Svidler and Leko.

I have a reasonable chess library, so I started to scan my bookshelves looking for a recent work on 4.Qc2. To my surprise, there was very little to look at. Dlugy and Ivan Sokolov are both strong grandmasters and big experts on 4.Qc2 and they both wrote books on the opening. However, Dlugy's book was written in 1990 and Sokolov's is from 1995. Despite their value, these books were clearly dated. Sokolov's 1997 ECO monograph has tons of information. It is still useful, especially for old lines that have seen few developments. Unfortunately this book has zero prose, in addition to being rather out of date. The most recent book I could find was from 2001 and it was written by Lalic. This book had some good things in it as well, but it really only covered lines that were fashionable and it ignored some major variations completely. By 2005, the lines it covered were not so fashionable, so I had very little to go on.

The bulk of what had been written in the last few years on 4.Qc2 had actually been written for Black. The Nimzo-Indian is a very popular opening, so in a way this was not so surprising. Although many of these books were quite good, they were of limited use to me because they only covered certain variations and were often biased towards Black.

Many modern professionals do not use chess books too much, especially the younger generation. They have been raised on computers and prefer to use large databases for their research. I, for one, have always loved chess books. The information has been sorted, there are explanations, and I can study chess almost anywhere. Honestly, I was very surprised that there was so little current literature on 4.Qc2, especially considering that it is the most popular variation against the most popular Black defence to 1.d4. Once I realized that I would have to do my 4.Qc2 Nimzo-Indian study "on my own", it occurred to me that I might want to write it all down. In the autumn of 2005, I was talking to Jacob Aagaard and I told him about my project. I was basically writing this book for myself, but because of the lack of 4.Qc2 literature on the market, I thought there may be others like me who may want to learn more about this interesting opening. The result is this book.

Many people were a great help to me while I was writing this book. First I would like to thank Jacob Aagaard for giving me the opportunity to write it and helping me with the format of the book. He also displayed tremendous patience with my computer "skills", especially at the outset of the project. I would also like to thank Vasik Rajlich for keeping me updated with the latest versions of his program Rybka (versions 2.1 and 2.2), which were used along with Fritz 9 to check many complicated variations. Many thanks go out to John Shaw, John Donaldson, Joe Fang, and especially Jim Rizzitano and Dean Ippolito for their help at various stages in the preparation of this work.

The endgame that arises after 8.. .h6 9.Bh4 d5 10.e3 Nbd7 11 .cxd5 Nxd5 12.Bxd8 Nxc3 13.Bh4 Nd5 14.Bf2 is still popular and very important. Recent times have seen White play other systems, not because the endgame is so easy for Black, but because other possibilities are also interesting and offer some promise to White. This line is still a good choice if you want a safe line where you can hope to squeeze a little bit.

If White wants to play 8.f3, he still has some chances to avoid the endgame. Unfortunately most of these deviations are pretty harmless. This chapter is still very important because Black has several ways to avoid the endgame. The good news is that if Black varies from Chapter 1, White has good chances of getting an advantage.

This old variation is not considered to be very dangerous. It is not completely harmless however, and the theory is still important. A study of this chapter will help one understand the struggle of White's bishop pair and space vs. Blacks lead in development and methods of achieving counterplay.

Bareev's system is a very modern variation. It is an ambitious system which is still very popular, and it is currently White's top choice against 4...0-0.

5) Sokolov Variation: 4...0-0 5.a3 Bxc3+ 6.Qxc3 b6 7.Bg5 Bb7 8.Nf3 This line was introduced by Ivan Sokolov. White intends to place his knight on d2. While this system probably does not give White much chance of achieving an advantage, the positions that arise are almost always interesting.

In this chapter we look at the popular alternatives to 7.. .Bb7, which are 7...Ba6 and 7...c5. White has good chances of achieving some advantage against either move, but it is not so simple and these lines should not be neglected.

Here we cover the ambitious lunge 6...Ne4 and Vitolinsh's gambit 6...b5. I do not think Black can easily claim equality in either line, but his play is very aggressive and White should be well prepared.

8) Central Variation: Main Line: 4...0-0 5.e4 d5

5.e4 was ignored by theory for a long time and it is not very well covered in chess literature. The play can become very sharp. After 5... d5, however, I believe that Black is doing quite well. Emms once said that the more he looked at this line, the more he liked it for White. Unfortunately, my feelings are rather the opposite and I think that Black has good chances if he knows his stuff.

9) Central Variation: Deviations: 4...0-0 5.e4 - 5...others

If, for whatever reason, Black is unhappy with 5...d5, he can play 5...c5 or 5...d6. If you want to employ 5. e4 as White, you must know these lines as well. The good news is White has a better chance of fighting for an advantage in the lines given in this chapter.

10) Zurich Variation (4...Nc6) and Black's rare 4th moves

The Zurich variation, as 4...Nc6 is called, is a solid line for Black. Although White has good chances of securing a theoretical advantage, the struggle in the middlegame is much more likely to be determined by ability rather than by knowledge of long variations. For that reason, this system is popular at club level. In this chapter I discuss the lines that I think give White the best chance of. fighting for a tangible initiative.

11) Romanishin: 6.e3: 4...d5 5.cxd5 Qxd5 6.e3

4.. .d5 is the move I would choose for Black. It is solid but also allows Black the chance to stir up trouble. This chapter looks at Romanishin's 5...Qxd5. The simple move 6.e3 has developed a large body of theory, but I think White has very little chance to achieve anything here.

12) Romanishin: 6.Nf3: 4...d5 5.cxd5 Qxd5 6.Nf3

The best response to 5...Qxd5 is 6.Nf3. After 6.. .Qf5, the best move is the obvious 7.Qxf5, which gives White a small edge in an interesting endgame. If White avoids this with either 7.Qd1 or 7.Qb3 Black can already think about taking over the initiative.

13) Accelerated PCA Variation: 4...d5 5.cxd5 exd5 6.Bg5 c5

Black can also play 5... exd5. This can lead to complications which are discussed in Chapter 15. If Black wants to reach these positions while avoiding the fixed pawn structure of Chapter 14, he can play 6....c5. This used to be a sideline but this move-order has become popular.

14) Exchange Variation: 4...d5 5.cxd5 exd5 6.Bg5 h6 7.Bxf6

By taking on f6, White removes a lot of the dynamism from the position. This used to be considered a safe method of playing for a small edge. Although it is still not too dangerous theoretically, the positions that arise are not as dull as many believe.

15) PCA Variation: 4...d5 5.cxd5 exd5 6.1g5 h6 7.&h4

This is one of the sharpest lines of the whole 4.Qc2 Nimzo-Indian. Often both kings are in some danger. Although the theory has not been totally resolved, many of the complications that arise in this chapter lead to a draw. There are still things to be discovered here, but at the moment Black is doing fine. For this reason I prefer 5.a3 as covered in Chapters 16-18.

This chapter introduces the sharp 5.a3. White refuses to make any positional concessions and grabs the two bishops. If Black wants to avoid the bulk of theory which is covered in Chapters 17 and 18, this is the place to look.

17) Adams Variation: 4...d5 5.a3 Bxc3+ 6.Qxc3 Ne4 7.Qc2 - 7...others

This chapter covers 7...e5 and 7...Nc6. There is less to learn here than in Chapter 18, and while these systems are interesting, White has good chances of getting an edge.

18) Modern Variation: 4...d5 5.a3 Bxc3+ 6.Qxc3 Ne4 7.Qc2 c5

The 7...c5 variation can be considered the main line of 5.a3. White has a choice of how to play. He can steer the game towards quiet positions, or he can grab a pawn and provoke a sharp battle across the whole board.

19) Knight Hop: 4...c5 5.dxc5 Na6

The uncompromising 5... Na6 has had bouts of popularity. Black bets everything on piece activity and hopes to chase White's queen around. This line can lead to exciting chess. If White knows his stuff and plays to control the position instead of grabbing material, he has good chances for an advantage.

20) Macieja Variation: 4...c5 5.dxc5 0-0 6.a3 Bxc5 7.Nf3 b6

This solid system of development has been popularised by Macieja. Black develops naturally and can often achieve a very comfortable hedgehog-type position. White must play very deliberately to achieve anything.

21) Deviations after 4...c5: 4...c5 5.dxc5 - 5...others

Something of an "odds and ends" chapter, here we look at less common Black 5 th moves as well as an old "equalizing variation". Many of the lines are quite tricky, so White should be well aware of these less common systems.